To my great satisfaction, I am asked by a pleasant correspondent, where and what the picture of the Princess’s Dream is. High up, in an out-of-the-way corner of the Academy of Venice, seen by no man—nor woman neither,—of all pictures in Europe the one I should choose for a gift, if a fairy queen gave me choice,—Victor Carpaccio’s “Vision of St. Ursula.”
The following letter, from the ‘Standard,’ is worth preserving:—
Sir,—For some time past the destruction of tons of young fry—viz., salmon, turbot, trout, soles, cod, whiting, etc.,—in fact, every fish that is to be found in the Thames,—has been enormous. I beg leave to say that it is now worse than ever, inasmuch as larger nets, and an increased number of them, are used, and the trade has commenced a month earlier than usual, from the peculiarity of the season.
At this time there are, at one part of the river, four or five vessels at work, which in one tide catch three tons of fry; this is sifted and picked over by hand, and about three per cent. of fry is all that can be picked out small enough for the London market. The remainder of course dies during the process, and is thrown overboard! Does the London consumer realize the fact that at least thirty tons a week of young fry are thus sacrificed? Do Londoners know that under the name of “whitebait” they eat a mixture largely composed of [94]sprat fry, a fish which at Christmas cost 9d. a bushel, but which now fetches 2s. a quart, which is £3 4s. a bushel? (Price regulated by Demand and Supply, you observe!—J. R.) It is bad enough that so many young salmon and trout are trapped and utterly wasted in these nets; but is it fair towards the public thus to diminish their supply of useful and cheap food?
Mr. Frank Buckland would faint, were he to see the wholesale destruction of young fry off Southend (on one fishing-ground only). I may truly say that the fishermen themselves are ashamed of the havoc they are making—well they may be; but who is to blame?
I have the honour to be, etc.,
Pisciculus.
Feb. 23.
The following note, written long before the last Fors on fish, bears on some of the same matters, and may as well find place now. Of the Bishop to whom it alludes, I have also something to say in next, or next, Fors. The note itself refers to what I said about the defence of Pope, who, like all other gracious men, had grave faults; and who, like all other wise men, is intensely obnoxious to evangelical divines. I don’t know what school of divines Mr. Elwyn belongs to; nor did I know his name when I wrote the note: I have been surprised, since, to see how good his work is; he writes with the precise pomposity of Macaulay, and in those worst and fatallest forms of fallacy which are true as far as they reach.
“There is an unhappy wretch of a clergyman I read of in the papers—spending his life industriously in showing the meanness of Alexander Pope—and how Alexander Pope cringed, and lied. He cringed—yes—to his friends;—nor is any man good for much who will not play spaniel to his friend, or his mistress, [95]on occasion;—to how many more than their friends do average clergymen cringe? I have had a Bishop go round the Royal Academy even with me,—pretending he liked painting, when he was eternally incapable of knowing anything whatever about it. Pope lied also—alas, yes, for his vanity’s sake. Very woful. But he did not pass the whole of his life in trying to anticipate, or appropriate, or efface, other people’s discoveries, as your modern men of science do so often; and for lying—any average partizan of religious dogma tells more lies in his pulpit in defence of what in his heart he knows to be indefensible, on any given Sunday, than Pope did in his whole life. Nay, how often is your clergyman himself nothing but a lie rampant—in the true old sense of the word,—creeping up into his pulpit pretending that he is there as a messenger of God, when he really took the place that he might be able to marry a pretty girl, and live like a ‘gentleman’ as he thinks. Alas! how infinitely more of a gentleman if he would but hold his foolish tongue, and get a living honestly—by street-sweeping, or any other useful occupation—instead of sweeping the dust of his own thoughts into people’s eyes—as this ‘biographer.’ ”
I shall have a good deal to say about human madness, in the course of Fors; the following letter, concerning the much less mischievous rabies of Dogs, is, however, also valuable. Note especially its closing paragraph. I omit a sentence here and there which seems to me unnecessary.
“On the 7th June last there appeared in the ‘Macclesfield Guardian’ newspaper a letter on Rabies and the muzzling and confining of Dogs, signed ‘Beth-Gêlert.’ That communication contained several facts and opinions relating to the disease; the possible causes of the same; and the uselessness and cruelty of muzzling and confinement as a preventive to it. The first-named [96]unnatural practice has been condemned (as was there shown) by no less authority than the leading medical journal of England,—which has termed muzzling ‘a great practical mistake, and one which cannot fail to have an injurious effect both upon the health and temper of dogs; for, although rabies is a dreadful thing, dogs ought not, any more than men, to be constantly treated as creatures likely to go mad.’
“This information and judgment, however, seem insufficient to convince some minds, even although they have no observations or arguments to urge in opposition. It may be useful to the public to bring forward an opinion on the merits of that letter expressed by the late Thomas Turner, of Manchester, who was not only a member of the Council, but one of the ablest and most experienced surgeons in Europe. The words of so eminent a professional man cannot but be considered valuable, and must have weight with the sensible and sincere; though on men of an opposite character all evidence, all reason, is too often utterly cast away.
“Mosley Street, June 8, 1873.
“ ‘Dear ——,—Thanks for your sensible letter. It contains great and kind truths, and such as humanity should applaud. On the subject you write about there is a large amount of ignorance both in and out of the profession.
“Ever yours,
“Thomas Turner.’
“In addition to the foregoing statement of the founder of the Manchester Royal School of Medicine and Surgery, the opinion shall now be given of one of the best veterinarians in London, who, writing on the above letter in the ‘Macclesfield Guardian,’ observed,—‘With regard to your paper on muzzling dogs, I feel certain from observation that the restraint put upon them by the muzzle is productive of evil, and has a tendency to cause fits, etc.’ [97]
“Rabies, originally spontaneous, was probably created, like many other evils which afflict humanity, by the viciousness, ignorance, and selfishness of man himself. ‘Man’s inhumanity to man makes countless thousands mourn,’—wrote the great peasant and national poet of Scotland. He would have uttered even a wider and more embracing truth had he said, man’s inhumanity to his fellow-creatures makes countless millions mourn. Rabies is most prevalent amongst the breeds of dogs bred and maintained for the atrocious sports of ‘the pit;’ they are likewise the most dangerous when victims to that dreadful malady. Moreover, dogs kept to worry other animals are also among those most liable to the disease, and the most to be feared when mad. But, on the other hand, dogs who live as the friends and companions of men of true humanity, and never exposed to annoyance or ill-treatment, remain gentle and affectionate even under the excruciating agonies of this dire disease. Delabere Blaine, first an army surgeon and subsequently the greatest veterinarian of this or probably of any other nation, tells us in his ‘Canine Pathology,’—
“ ‘It will sensibly affect any one to witness the earnest, imploring look I have often seen from the unhappy sufferers under this dreadful malady. The strongest attachment has been manifested to those around during their utmost sufferings; and the parched tongue has been carried over the hands and feet of those who noticed them, with more than usual fondness. This disposition has continued to the last moment of life,—in many cases, without one manifestation of any inclination to bite, or to do the smallest harm.’
“Here is another instance of ‘with whatsoever measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again.’ The cruelty of man, as it ever does, recoils, like a viper, ultimately on man. He who invests in the Bank of Vice receives back his capital with compound interest at a high rate and to the uttermost farthing. [98]
“When a mad dog bites many people, he sometimes quits scores for a long, long arrear of brutalities, insults, and oppression inflicted upon him by the baser portion of mankind:—the hard blow, the savage kick, the loud curse, the vile annoyance, the insulting word, the starving meal, the carrion food, the shortened chain, the rotten straw, the dirty kennel (appropriate name), the bitter winter’s night, the parching heat of summer, the dull and dreary years of hopeless imprisonment, the thousand aches which patient merit of the unworthy takes, are represented, culminate there; and the cup man has poisoned, man is forced to drink.
“All these miseries are often, too often, the lot of this most affectionate creature, who has truly been called ‘our faithful friend, gallant protector, and useful servant.’
“No muzzling, murder, or incarceration tyrannically inflicted on this much-enduring, much-insulted slave by his master, will ever extirpate rabies. No abuse of the wondrous creature beneficently bestowed by the Omniscient and Almighty on ungrateful man, to be the friend of the poor and the guardian of the rich, will ever extirpate rabies. Mercy and justice would help us much more.
“In many lands the disease is utterly unknown,—in the land of Egypt, for example, where dogs swarm in all the towns and villages. Yet the follower of Mohammed, more humane than the follower of Christ,—to our shame be it spoken,—neither imprisons, muzzles, nor murders them. England, it is believed, never passed such an Act of Parliament as this before the present century. There is, certainly, in the laws of Canute a punishment awarded to the man whose dog went mad, and by his negligence wandered up and down the country. A far more sensible measure than our own. Canute punished the man, not the dog. Also, in Edward the Third’s reign, all owners of fighting dogs whose dogs were found wandering about the [99]streets of London were fined. Very different species of legislation from the brainless or brutal Dog’s Act of 1871, passed by a number of men, not one of whom it is probable either knew or cared to know anything of the nature of the creature they legislated about; not even that he perspires, not by means of his skin, but performs this vital function by means of his tongue, and that to muzzle him is tantamount to coating the skin of a man all over with paint or gutta-percha. Such selfishness and cruelty in this age appears to give evidence towards proof of the assertion made by our greatest writer on Art,—that ‘we are now getting cruel in our avarice,’—‘our hearts, of iron and clay, have hurled the Bible in the face of our God, and fallen down to grovel before Mammon.’—If not, how is it that we can so abuse one of the Supreme’s most choicest works,—a creature sent to be man’s friend, and whose devotion so often ‘puts to shame all human attachments’?
“We are reaping what we have sown: Rabies certainly seems on the increase in this district,—in whose neighbourhood, it is stated, muzzling was first practised. It may spread more widely if we force a crop. The best way to check it, is to do our duty to the noble creature the Almighty has entrusted to us, and treat him with the humanity and affection he so eminently deserves. To deprive him of liberty and exercise; to chain him like a felon; to debar him from access to his natural medicine; to prevent him from following the overpowering instincts of his being and the laws of Nature, is conduct revolting to reason and religion.
“The disease of rabies comes on by degrees, not suddenly. Its symptoms can easily be read. Were knowledge more diffused, people would know the approach of the malady, and take timely precautions. To do as we now do,—namely, drive the unhappy creatures insane, into an agonizing sickness by sheer ignorance or inhumanity, and then, because one is ill, [100]tie up the mouths of the healthy, and unnaturally restrain all the rest, is it not the conduct of idiots rather than of reasonable beings?
“Why all this hubbub about a disease which causes less loss of life than almost any other complaint known, and whose fatal effects can, in almost every case, be surely and certainly prevented by a surgeon? If our lawgivers and lawmakers (who, by the way, although the House of Commons is crowded with lawyers, do not in these times draw Acts of Parliament so that they can be comprehended, without the heavy cost of going to a superior court,) wish to save human life, let them educate the hearts as well as heads of Englishmen, and give more attention to boiler and colliery explosions, railway smashes, and rotten ships; to the overcrowding and misery of the poor; to the adulteration of food and medicines. Also, to dirt, municipal stupidity, and neglect; by which one city alone, Manchester, loses annually above three thousand lives.
“I am, your humble servant,
“Beth-Gelert.”
[101]
FORS CLAVIGERA.